A Political Approach to a Historic Problem: Student Safety in Schools.

Essays | Konor Nichols | October 30th, 2023.

School violence has become increasingly concerning within the United States, and one unavoidable topic of discussion is school shootings. Although school shootings have been steadily increasing over time, there are notable spikes. The first began in the 1890s, which Professor at Troy University, JeeHae Helen Lee, argues is the result of rapid urbanization’s impact on culture clashes during this period. The second spike she identifies has occurred since the 1980s in correlation with the rise of access to violent media. Despite school violence being driven by extraneous factors, such as economic and cultural ones, the root of solving it has long remained one of politics. This report will examine the political solutions to this historic issue, specifically delving into the issues of gun legislation, Student Resource Officers, and Zero Tolerance Policy to answer the following question: to what extent should US state governments impose security measures to most effectively ensure student safety in public schools? This issue has been one that has historically increased in occurrence and concern that not only negatively impacts the school environment but also puts students at long-term risks. Thus, this issue is one of great importance and needs to be addressed by US State lawmakers to discontinue this string of violence.

Gun legislation is one of much controversy within the United States due to its long history of being supported by the Second Amendment of the Constitution. Despite this, many experts in politics and public health have argued for gun legislation within the context of school shootings and the subsequent school security debates. Thomas F. Brezenski, professor of Political Science and Law and Government, argues that gun legislation is necessary but not viable on an aggressive level due to lobbyists that exist at federal and state levels, such as the National Rifle Association (NRA). He provides an example of this as he recounts his experience with the survivors of the historic Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Shooting almost witnessing “the Florida legislature banning assault-style weapons.”However, he claims that the ban failed due to the heavy influence of the president of the NRA over Republican Congressmen, resulting in a 71-36 vote “to not consider a ban on assault-style weapons.” With lobbyist influence in mind, Brezenski proposes more realistic and viable gun legislation: “a ban on LCMs (large capacity magazines), a ban on assault-style weapons like the AR-15, and the implementation of universal background checks.” Consequently, despite the need for more gun regulation to prevent school shootings, aggressive forms of gun legislation may hinder the success of passing life-saving policy reform. Although Brezenski is not alone in viewing gun legislation as a key milestone in securing schools, other experts inversely approach what type of reform is best to achieve this goal. Paul M. Reeping, coordinator for the International Society for Disease, analyzes the relationship between school shootings to the permissiveness of gun legislation by state. Reeping agrees with Brezenski about the necessity of political action for gun policy but disagrees on the aggressiveness of such policies. In his study, Reeping and other contributors found that “[f]or every ten-unit higher score on the permissiveness of state firearm laws scale, the rate of school shootings was 10.5% higher,” meaning that creating stricter legislation is the most effective solution to gun violence in schools. Similarly, Mark Gius, professor of statistics at Quinnipiac University, expands upon the findings of Reeping. He begins his paper by investigating the relationship between gun laws and school shootings. After producing an equation to analyze this relationship, Gius reveals that “the number of school shooting victims was 54.4% less than when the assault weapons ban was not in effect.” Therefore, because this test for the effect of complete weapons bans on school shootings yielded the lowest percent of school shooting victims, Gius concludes that aggressive gun control legislation, specifically a complete assault weapons ban, is the most effective at reducing the rate of school shooting victims. Despite the disagreement among experts as to what level of reform should exist, it is clear that the current legislation in place must improve to keep students safe from school shootings. This step is one that US states must not ignore, as student life is necessary to ensure student safety.

Due to the overall rise in school violence, Student Resource Officers (SROs) have historically been a common solution employed among public schools nationally. Dr. Randall Beger, professor at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire’s Criminal Justice Program, argues that despite the obvious usefulness of having an on-campus officer, their incorporation into the student environment puts students’ safety further at risk through the violation of their Fourth Amendment Rights, which details the protection from unreasonable search and seizure. To illustrate this, Beger cites an Illinois Supreme Court Case, Dilworth vs. The People (1996), in which, the court investigates how an SRO searched a student suspected of carrying drugs. The court ruled that held that “lower expectations of privacy in the school setting…supported a sharp departure from the probable cause standard for a school liaison officer,” representing an extreme encroachment on the Fourth Amendment Rights of students, further endangering them. Spencer Weiler, Associate Professor at the Schools of Law and Science at BYU, and Martha Cray, professor at the University of Northern Colorado, agree with Beger’s faults of the SRO program and identify their causes and solutions. The first issue Weiler and Cray cite is the ambiguity of an SRO’s job under the law, which they aim to resolve with the Supreme Court’s guidance and passage of legislation, stating that “‘[l]egislation is needed in all 50 states to clarify the ambiguous role police officers assigned to schools.’” The second origin of the SRO program’s issues is its flawed system of funding. Weiler and Cray claim that a resolution of the issues generated by this program must involve ensuring a steady flow of federal spending years after the program receives its initial grant. In doing so, state legislatures may allow for the currently flawed SRO program to fulfill its intended purpose of ensuring student safety on a physical level from illegal activity while upholding the fundamental rights of students.

Zero Tolerance Policy (ZTP) has historically been integrated to maintain safety and order within public schools by “mandating severe and certain punishments regardless of individual circumstances,” such as “suspensions and expulsions” for any dictated crime, according to MinJune Song, an independent scholar. However, according to Philip Mongan and Robert Walker, professors of social sciences, federal actions, like the 1994 Gun-Free Schools Act, “[force] primary and secondary school districts in the United States to adopt zero-tolerance weapons policies,” extending ZTP’s scope nationally. Rosa R. Hirji, co-chair for the Children’s Rights Litigation Committee, explains that ZTP originally took precedence “in the context of an era starting in the 1980s that saw a rise in mass incarceration, and shocking disproportionate rates of incarceration of people of color” and was “[d]riven by the War on Drugs.” Therefore, the policy is disproportionately harsh when employed under normal circumstances, resulting in violations of students’ individual and civil rights and posing problems for due process, equality, and public education rights. Thus, despite it being a strict policy that promises to ensure student safety from illegal activity, ZTP is instead endangering the fundamental rights of students. Meghan Wicker Darby, Associate Attorney, extends on the effects posed by Hirji, claiming that ZTP targets marginalized students and severely hinders their long-term success. Darby furthers that ZTP “take[s] disciplining discretion away from teachers and put[s] it in the hands of the state[,] fuel[ing] the [prison] pipeline,” ultimately guiding her to the solution she posits: a restorative justice approach rather than zero tolerance one, which focuses more on education of wrong-doing rather than extreme punishment, promising to uphold the fundamental ideas of natural rights which are being stripped from students under ZTP. Therefore, because ZTP has created an insecure environment for students’ rights and continued to inadequately punish crimes perpetrated on campus, ZTP requires reform to accomplish its goal of ensuring student safety.

After examining the effect of gun legislation, Student Resource Officers, and Zero Tolerance Policy on the rate of school violence to answer the question at hand, it becomes clear that US state governments have already recognized and begun to take steps toward solving this problem. However, the cited research also elucidates how these policies and actions have not fulfilled their intended purposes effectively. Thus, to ensure the safety of students that is continuing to be violated or unprotected, US State governments must work to repeal, replace, or reform the existing policies which may potentially solve the issue of the lack of safety for students amid increasingly uncertain and violent school environments. In doing so, states may ensure that students remain safe and alive within their schools as the current legislative framework intends but fails to do.